Just over three years ago, the House of Representatives voted to prevent [1] then-President Donald Trump from pulling the U.S. out of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Twenty-two Republicans [2] voted against it.
Trump has since left office (but not the arena, sadly); NATO is coming together to help Ukraine fight off Russian [3] aggression [4]; and the House is voting again – this time on a non-binding resolution “to uphold the founding democratic principles of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization”…
… and the Republican “no” votes [5] rose to 63.
There’s no nice way to put it: The Putinist wing [6] of the GOP is growing like a cancer. Will Saletan has more examples in The Bulwark [7], but as he wrote it before the aforementioned vote, even his many examples pale in comparison.
Lest anyone think these are mere gadflies, the anti-NATO wing of the Republican Party now includes the ranking members of the House Appropriations [8] Committee, the House Budget [9] Committee, the Defense Intelligence and Warfighter Support (DIWS) [10] Subcommittee, and the Counterterrorism, Counterintelligence, and Counterproliferation (C3) [10] Subcommittee.
Unless the Democrats maintain control of the House – and they’re not the favorites at this hour – those four gavels would be wielded by on-the-record opponents of NATO.
The war in Ukraine has been a revelation within the Republican Party. A very few, such as Adam Kinzinger [11], have looked back on their tribalist behavior during Trump’s first impeachment and admitted to their mistake. Far more have decided that anything that smacks of supporting the Black Sea democracy must be opposed.
Until that reverses itself, the GOP cannot be trusted with power anywhere, especially not where those willing to vote against NATO would become one of the most powerful members of Congress under a Republican majority.